


True Kinda Love

by Well_Then_Extract



Series: Zadr Week Phase 2 2019 [2]
Category: Invader Zim
Genre: Fluff, I wrote this in two days and I thought it'd be short but it's really long but it's very shitty, Love Confessions, M/M, cringe culture is dead here is my zadr fic with a steven universe song title, fuck you, literally three whole characters, there's like light angst but it last for like five minutes, y'all know what it is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 04:49:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21404461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Well_Then_Extract/pseuds/Well_Then_Extract
Summary: Dib goes mopes in the park and gets an unexpected visitor.Gays in the park, what will they confess?Zadr week day one: confession
Relationships: Dib/Zim (Invader Zim)
Series: Zadr Week Phase 2 2019 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1543864
Comments: 10
Kudos: 134





	True Kinda Love

**Author's Note:**

> Aaaaand here. Here is where I mark the official point where my friends can NOT find out about my ao3 account. I have fallen down the pit, I have sealed my fate.  
Anyway, it's zadr week! And I am feeling the grind. I meant for this to be a short little ficlet but god it's almost twice the amount I intended. I love the idea of confessions on a playground and idk why but vibing on playgrounds is such a fun thing to me.  
Also I wrote this really fast and disjointedly and I think I may be disassociating right now so I'm not sure how this is, but like it's here and I cannot be sad during Zadr week.  
Here is part one of seven of my breakdown, I hope you enjoy.

When Dib was a kid he had a place that he’d run off to and hide when he felt overwhelmed or scared. He’d scramble out of the back door and scurry over the fence, usually crying, and he’d run down to the park, he’d crawl into the tube connecting the two platforms, and he’d sit there. Dib would hide in a scrunched up bawl in the plastic tube until his sister came to get him, frowning and telling him to come home with indifference. He didn’t want to be in his room, in his house at all, he didn’t want anyone to be able to bother him.

Dib can’t count how many hours he’s spent hiding in that chute of plastic, watching the world quietly through the holes cut in the sides, crying silently on the playground by himself. It was relaxing, quiet, closed off, and no one ever really bothered him, so he found himself returning there, even as he grew up.

And that night, Dib wandered back down to the playground again.

It was empty, it usually was, and the wood chips were damp with rain from last night’s rainstorm. The sun was setting, it was getting colder, everything was coated in amber light from the sunset.

He wasn’t even entirely sure why he was feeling the need to drag himself down there and hide for a while, but he was already halfway there before he realized he didn’t know what he was doing.

Everything was just kind of piling up, and Dib just needed a minute. He just needed to sit in silence for a little bit, he just needed to process some things.

His dad was getting on his ass again, always bugging him about his career choice and what he was going to do after high skool, and Dib didn’t want to think about that right now.

(He didn’t want to think about that right now because he didn’t know what he was going to do, because he was just going to graduate from high skool and figure it out.)

Dib was tired of dealing with the stress and the pressure and the constant questioning, he just wanted a break.

Most things were the same, but he found he was tired of the familiarity too. No one talked to him, the classes were boring, he got bad grades because he couldn’t find it in himself to try, everything repeated like that. Dib was getting sick of the same things happening every day, without any change, and he could feel the exhaustion of routine start to weigh heavy on his mind.

To make matters worse, the one person Dib did talk to was ignoring him, and he hadn’t even done anything. Zim was acting weird, getting all flighty when Dib tried to talk to him, hurriedly breaking eye contact if Dib ever managed to catch Zim’s eye in the first place. That was incredibly weird for Zim, who never missed an opportunity to lord anything and everything over Dib, so his guard was officially up. Though Dib didn’t even have time to investigate it even if he wanted to since his dad was taking up so much of his time with internship interviews and forcing Dib into the lab and whatever free time Dib had leftover was spent working on skool work.

Dib paused on the sidewalk, his thoughts halting for a second.

Besides, maybe it wasn’t just that he was suspicious of Zim.

He kept walking as his thoughts continued to spiral.

Recently, it occurred to Dib that Zim was one of the only kids at skool who talked to him, who didn’t dart out of his way in the halls and didn’t fiercely avoid eye contact. Even more recently, it dawned upon Dib that Zim might be his only friend.

They talked all the time, just because no one else talked to them, just to fill the silence. They only talked in skool because the quiet was unnerving, they only sat together at lunch so then Dib wouldn’t have to sit in his car, they only partnered up on projects so then they wouldn’t have to do twice the work alone. Through the power of default, he and Zim became friends.

Although, it wasn’t about a month ago when he and Zim actually did something outside of skool that Dib _realized_ they were friends. Before that, Dib just guessed they just tolerated each other because no one else would.

They were at the mall because Gaz had forced Dib to give her a ride and for some reason, Dib thought it would be a good idea to invite Zim. Really, he didn’t know what he was doing until he showed up at Zim’s house and Gaz was yelling at him for taking her there. After arguing with Zim on his doorstep for five minutes, he managed to coax him into the car and to the mall (Dib is still a little proud of that, of being able to convince Zim to go with him).

At some point as he and Zim broke all the rules of the mall arcade, as Dib climbed on top of the Skeeball machine and threw all of the balls into the one thousand point hole, as Zim shook the pinball game while Dib played, Dib noticed he was having fun. At some point, while Zim traded in their illegally earned sum of tickets for a bear that was almost bigger than he was, Dib felt like he wanted to do this again. Then, even more worrying, as Zim walked back to his house, dragging that stupid bear behind him, Dib realized he kind of sort of didn’t want Zim to leave quite yet.

Even more recently than both of those past realizations, Dib woke up in the middle of the night from an unsettling dream with the horrifying knowledge that he may have feelings for Zim. They built up in his stomach and crawled up his neck, his heartbeat was erratic. Fondness pooled inside him, heavy in his thoughts, hot on his cheeks. His palms were all sweaty and his head was swimming. Once he realized that, he lay face down on his bed and screamed into his pillow. He stayed in bed until one in the afternoon, he wasn’t even doing anything, just thinking. Just thinking he was completely fucked, oh God this was so bad.

Dib hadn’t really thought about it since then, he had enough to worry about without even factoring in everything that came with the current situation. He didn’t want to think about what this information made him (a xenophile, maybe), about what he’d do, about how he’d fix what was going on, he just ignored it.

Dib even went through a (brief) period where he ignored Zim because every single fucking thing he did made Dib’s stomach flip and he couldn’t look at Zim without getting all flustered. 

_God. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck._

See, there was a _reason_ Dib had avoided thinking about these things, but as he hid inside the tunnel on the playground, he found the thoughts coming back to him.

Even though Dib went through a short time where he brushed off Zim, he got over it. As he said, it didn’t last long, the extra steps he had to take to not come into contact with Zim were annoying for one thing, and there was a part of him that got louder each day that yearned for Zim’s attention. So he fell back into their usual routine, trying not to choke on his food whenever Zim did something particularly hard to handle, like laugh or make eye contact.

Dib had already gone through the phase of ‘God I’m so pathetic this whole situation is so pathetic I’m a disgusting person’ but he still felt a tug of shame thinking about all of this.

It didn’t matter anyway, Zim had been icing Dib out for a few weeks now, and Dib was starting to go a little crazy.

When Dib didn’t talk to Zim for that one month he was into “real science” back in middle skool, Zim lost his mind and didn’t do anything except lay on the couch the whole time. Yet now Zim was doing the same thing, just leaving Dib hanging, and he expected Dib to be okay with it, to just move on with his life. It’s not like it was in middle skool, things matter more now, and Dib was getting tired of sitting with Gaz and her friends at lunch and not having anyone to talk to during the skool day.

Now, Dib had all these feelings, weighing heavy on his shoulders and sinking in his chest, and he didn’t know what to do with them. Zim wasn’t talking to him, when Dib kind of needed him to, and Dib was trying not to admit how much he was falling apart. He skipped a lot, and maybe that was a problem but he hated his classes and he hated his peers and not having Zim to even just make a passing remark to in the hallways was getting to him.

Another reason why he was hiding in a tube on a playground.

Dib sighed and adjusted his position, his boots made a squeaking sound as he moved them against the plastic.

The sun was setting outside his tunnel of self-pity, the saturated purple light shone through the holes in the plastic, illuminating the inside of the green tunnel.

Dib ran his fingers over a piece of graffiti that read ‘fuck the cops’ written in sharpie. He didn’t write that, he only wrote a few things in there, but he appreciated the person who did.

Dib sighed and thumped the back of his head against the green plastic behind him.

The playground was starting to get cold in the autumn air, without the heat of the sun, he could feel the coolness against his hands and through his clothes.

Then Dib heard the crunch of wood chips, someone was walking towards him. He heard soft footsteps on the playground steps, across the wobbly bridge, and finally, they stopped just outside the tube Dib was in, waiting on the platform.

He came to the playground to be alone, to think, to wallow in self-pity privately while he listened to angsty music on his phone. Today though, it seemed like he had a visitor.

Dib saw tiny black legs and long boots, he didn’t have to look twice to know who was there.

“Can- uh, can I come in?”

“What do you want Zim?” Dib asked loudly, his voice echoed hollowly in the tunnel.

“Zim would like access to your Earth child chute.”

“Why? I don’t know if it’s not obvious but I kinda want to be left alone right now,”

There was a moment of silence, and Dib had to glance back over to the entrance to make sure Zim was still there.

When Zim spoke again, it was quieter.

“I have to tell you something,”

“Can’t you say it from outside the tube? I’m having a personal moment in here,”

“Stupid Dib-stink! Zim can do whatever he wants! I was making an effort to respect your privacy or _whatever_ but I will come into this filthy chute of graffiti whenever I feel like it!”

Dib winced from the sudden shouting but scooted over to make room for Zim anyway (not that he needed much room).

“You know this playground is the perfect size for you, you’re about the size of the average human six-year-old,” Dib teased as Zim climbed into the tube with some struggle.

Zim didn’t reply besides a grunt of annoyance. He clambered into the tube clumsily, sitting next to Dib and staring straight ahead at the wall. Zim had sat so close that their thighs brushed each other, and Dib’s breathing got a little faster.

“How did you find me here?” Dib asked.

“Your female sibling told me you were here when I went to your house, she said you were ‘moping’,” Zim put moping in quotes and still didn’t look at Dib.

Dib was suddenly a little worried that Zim had figured out Dib had a crush on him and was here to effectively end their friendship.

(The thought had occurred to him before, but it hit him especially hard now.)

Dib hummed and nervously fiddled with the chord of his earbuds.

“Yeah, well, here I am.”

“Here you are,” Zim echoed quietly, more to himself than anything.

Dib looked over at Zim, his antenna were stuck up so high that they brushed the top of the tube.

“You had to tell me something, right?”

“That is correct.”

“Well, shoot.”

“What?”

“Go ahead,” Dib sighed in exasperation.

Zim nodded, there was a brief movement behind his cheek in his mouth like he was chewing on his cheek or something. He took a deep breath, his face was discolored. Dib couldn’t tell if it was a blush or not, green patches lining his cheeks. Maybe he was cold, maybe he was molting like a snake and that’s why he’s been avoiding Dib.

Zim exhaled shakily, eyes squeezed shut.

“Zim has been thinking-”

“That’s a first”

Zim looked over at Dib then just to glare at him.

“Sorry,” Dib put his hands up in surrender, “sorry, continue.”

Zim pulled his knees in closer, wrapping a small arm around them. He had upgraded his outfit from middle skool, adding different shirts and jackets, although his usual outfit was the same stupid tunic-dress thing just with a jacket thrown on top. Which was what he was wearing now, just with a jean jacket with fluff inside the collar and stuffed inside the sleeves.

“Recently Zim has not been doing a very good job of this human friendship thing, and he realizes this, and there is a reason for it.”

Dib raised his eyebrows.

“Really?”

“Yes, so just hear me out.” Dib decided against teasing Zim about what human phrases he can pick up on and use, and which ones he can’t.

_Sure, he knows ‘hear me out’ but not ‘sister’._

“Got it,” Dib murmurs, he’s not entirely sure where this is going.

It’s getting a little colder, a little darker, the sun is hanging low enough that light doesn’t filter in through the cutout windows anymore.

Zim shuddered, curling in on himself further. His pak was casting a pink glow on the plastic behind him, it was emitting a soft heat too, like a tiny heater.

Dib scooted just a little closer to Zim, and if he asked he’d say that it was cold and Zim’s pak was warm.

“The reason Zim has been ignoring you Dib-thing is because…” Zim trailed off, turning his head completely away from Dib and whispering the rest of the sentence out.

“You what? I didn’t catch that last part Spaceboy,” Dib leaned forward, trying to look at Zim’s face. His tone was taunting, but he genuinely wanted to know what was so important that Zim sought him out and dragged himself in front of Dib, completely open and honest.

“_I have romantic feelings for you!_” Zim shrieked, his voice echoed in the tube, metallic and loud, he yanked on his antenna in distress.

“Ugly, disgusting, sickly, human love feelings. I’ve been infected with them, and it’s your fault, and it’s your fault I can’t get rid of them, and it’s your fault that I’m even in this position, to begin with!” He continues, yelling and pulling harder on his antenna.

Dib watches, wide-eyed and silent, still processing what Zim said.

“I’ve been trying to figure out why this happened, how to stop it, how to dispose of these sappy, useless thoughts, but I can’t seem to figure anything out. It seemed, according to standard human romantic content, that the only way to solve this problem was to confess it to you.” Zim scrunches up in a little ball again, still not looking at Dib. “Zim understands this is hard to hear, it was hard for me to realize, and if this concludes our human friendship relationship Zim understands. Just commence the rejection ritual so I can get home to Gir.”

Then Dib started laughing.

“Why are you laughing?” Zim asked, voice soft. His antenna lowered, his eyes were wide when he finally glanced over at Dib, he looked even smaller than usual.

Dib kept laughing, he couldn’t stop now, so he just shook his head.

“Why are you laughing at Zim!?” he demanded, straightening his back and antenna flying upwards again.

“I’m sorry,” he giggled, holding a hand up over his mouth to try to stop the laughing fit, “it’s just so ridiculous,”

Zim looks hurt for a flash, then it’s immediately replaced by anger.

“I should have known you’d use this against me, disgusting Dib-filth, I shouldn’t have expected so much of you. I shouldn’t have expected basic decency, it was foolish of me to trust you with anything,” Zim spat, he was already moving to climb out of the tube, shifting to storm off.

“Wait, wait,” Dib grabbed Zim’s arm, it was so small in his hand, he was still laughing a little, “hold on.”

“Why? So you can make this even more painful for me? So you can rub my face in it even more?”

“No, listen, dumbass-” Dib pulled on Zim’s arm, forcing to sit back down, “just listen to me for a second.”

Zim sighed, looking up at Dib through his stupid contacts, they were so close that of his antennas almost hit Dib in the face.

“It’s ridiculous because I have- God how did you phrase it- romantic human feelings for you too.”

Zim stilled in Dib’s hold.

“You what.” he deadpanned, eyes widening further than Dib thought was possible.

“Moron, I’ve liked you for like, weeks now.”

Zim just blinked at him, stiffening.

“When I went through that phase of not talking to you? Yeah, that’s why. Same thought process, I guess.” Dib paused, trying to think of how to continue. “It’s crazy because I think we’re in the same situation, and have been for weeks, without realizing it.”

Zim relaxed a little, dropping his hand so it rested on Dib’s thigh.

“Because I’ve been thinking about you, all the time, I’ve been going crazy and like-” Dib laughed again, tired and soft “I didn’t even consider thinking that you might feel the same in any capacity.”

Zim just stared at him, his antenna flicked occasionally, Dib wasn’t even entirely sure he was listening.

“I think we’ve been running in circles this whole time,”

“It seems that way,”

There was a beat of silence, and finally, they were able to make eye contact now.

“What do we do now?” Zim asked.

“What do you want to do now?”

“I’m unsure, I didn’t think we’d get this far.”

They stayed silent again for a minute, trying to figure out how to continue. Dib was kinda hoping Zim knew what to do, maybe he had researched enough that he could figure it out. All of this was new to Dib too, he had no idea what he was doing.

“Is it supposed to feel this gross?” Zim muttered, he was looking out of the cutout window at the dark sky.

“Yeah, it’s awful.”

“It really is, it feels like Zim’s insides are melting, it feels like I’ve caught some sort of horrific Earth fever.”

Dib looked over at Zim, snorting slightly in amusement.

“Right, yeah. It doesn’t feel great when it’s one-sided, huh?”

“Not at all, it’s disgusting, I can’t believe humans do this all the time.”

“I know, I don’t know how we do it.”

“Irkens don’t, or they’re not supposed to. It’s inconvenient, it’s pointless, it hinders our ability to do our job, to fulfill our purpose.” Zim swallows harshly, eyes glued to the floor. “You’re not even supposed to feel anything like this ideally…”

Dib doesn’t push Zim to continue, he knows the road he’s going down, he doesn’t need to hear Zim say it.

“Will you get in trouble for this?”

“I’d already be in trouble, the worst part is the existence of feelings, not what you do with them. Acting on romantic feelings doesn’t make the crime of having them any worse.” Zim was quiet again, he reached over and grabbed Dib’s hand, lifting it up and spreading his fingers out like he was examining them. “There’s not really a point in avoiding this, avoiding you, it’d be the same outcome, just more painful and with extra steps.”

Dib didn’t know what to say, he just stared at Zim and limply let him move his hand around.

"At least we're both in the same position, at least we know there's one other person in the universe stupid enough to fall in love tih an alien."

They were quiet again, Zim playing with Dib's fingers and staring ahead solemnly.

“Does it ever feel better?” Zim questioned lowly, voice cracked open and vulnerable.

“Eventually,” Dib whispered, he laced his fingers through Zim’s even though it took him a minute to adjust to the whole three fingers thing, “it eventually gets better. When you’re in a relationship, it’s different. It’s nicer when you know the other person is feeling the same way, when you can kinda share the load. It’s not so much a painful thing, it’s more special.”

Zim nodded, eyes focused on his and Dib’s hands laced together.

“I hope so,” he mumbled, the green patches on his cheeks had gotten bigger (brighter too maybe).

“And you want to know something else that’s cool?”

“What?”

“You get to do things like this,” Dib leaned over the short distance between them, and messily kissed Zim in a green tunnel on a playground.

Dib was kissing an alien in a tunnel on a playground, his first kiss was with an alien on an October evening on a playground.

It was sloppy because neither of them had done it before and the fact that Zim had no nose made Dib readjust a little, but every nerve in Dib still lit up like sparks in his veins, every hair stood on end.

It suddenly dawned on Dib just how much he had wanted to do this.

He delicately and timidly cupped Zim’s cheek, slightly shifting to adapt to the angular curve of his face, propping himself up with his other hand, the cool plastic of the tunnel digging into his skin. He ran his thumb up gently along the base of Zim's antenna, keeping Zim's jaw secure in his palm.

Zim relaxed suddenly, collapsing like a ragdoll in Dib’s hold, slouching forward into his hand, twitching a little whenever Dib brushed his antenna. Dib could feel Zim's breaht hitch. An antenna brushed against Dib’s cheek, gentle and curious, Dib shivered. Zim delicately combed a three-fingered hand through Dib's hair, twirling a strand on the back of his neck around his finger.

Eventually, Dib pulled away, looking at Zim with wide eyes, his whole face was burning. He didn’t let go of Zim’s face, and Zim’s antenna swiped against his cheek again, nudging a splotch of heat on his face.

“This is a better outcome than Zim expected,” Zim spoke eventually, voice gentle.

“Yeah, better than I expected too.” Dib breathed, his head was spinning.

“To be completely honest, I was terrified to tell you about this. I was convinced you’d hold it against me,”

Dib laughed again, less frantic now.

“Me too, you don’t have the best track record of keeping secrets.”

“Neither do you!” Zim accused lightheartedly, gently pushing Dib with the arm that wasn’t still on his thigh.

“Wow, shoving, you’ve done your research on this Spaceboy,”

“Yes! Zim has studied many rituals of human courtship and ‘flirting’.” Zim explained, idly waving a hand around. “Like this, for example-”

Zim punched Dib solidly in the arm, it hit hard enough that Dib felt like it’d leave a bruise.

“Ow, oh my God, you’re not supposed to punch that hard.”

“You’re just being a baby,” Zim replied, grinning. “Learn to take a punch, baby.”

He punched his arm again.

“You need to _stop_ doing that.”

“Yeah? Or you’ll what?” Zim punched his forearm again.

“You’ll hit me back? Huh, Dib-stink? What are you going to do?” Another punch, followed by a playful antenna swat at Dib’s cheek.

So Dib bent forward, again, kissing him, again, trying not to lose his balance when Zim’s antenna swept along his jaw.

Dib thought didn’t actually mind the interruption in his playground tube moping time as he stroked his thumb over Zim’s cheek.

**Author's Note:**

> Dib, confessing his love to Zim: hey panini head are you listening to me?  
Okay so this is my third time writing these characters and my first time publishing it so I hope it's not too ooc. Also it's really late and life is a struggle and I'm trying my goddamn best to get his done on time.  
(Not to brag but I kinda went off with the dialogue here and I don't know how it happened but low key I'm kinda proud.)  
ANYWAY, my tumblr is punchyshipszadr! My dms and ask box are open, feel free to drop by. Comments and kudos make my whole year.  
Thank you for reading!


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